The founding of France?

Question

When was France founded?????? I researched this for hours recently, but I can't find it!

Answer 1

It was never really "founded", but if you research Charlemagne (Charles the Great) you'll find he's credited with uniting the various tribes and is considered the father of both France and of Europe.

This has a pretty decent explanation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne

Answer 2

Few European nations have a precise founding date the way New World countries do.

From "A Concise History of France" by Roger Price (Cambridge University Press, 1993):

"The entity we know as France is the product of a centuries' long evolution, during which a complex of regional societies were welded together by political action, by the desire for territorial aggrandisement of a sucession of monarchs, ministers and soldiers. There was nothing ineveitable about the outcome. It was far from being a linear development, and we must try to avoid a teleological approach to explaining it's course. The central feature was the emergence of a relatively strong state in the Ile-de-France and the expansion of its authority." (p.1)

That probably goes a long way toward explaining why you can't find a date.

Answer 3

843 for the name France but as the other answers say, we can't really speak about a foundation.